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The Attwater Prairie Chicken National Wildlife Refuge held a ribbon cutting ceremony for the grand opening of their new headquarters on Friday, April 4 and hosted their 27th annual Boomin’ and Bloomin’ festival Saturday, April 5 through Sunday, April 6.
The grand opening of the new headquarters features a visitor center with displays of all the wildlife found on the prairie, as well as a display of the endangered prairie chicken, an informational booth and an educational video about the work being done on the refuge and more.
A barbeque lunch was held alongside the grand opening and ribbon cutting as well as traditional Native American dances performed, including a dance mimicking the prairie chicken’s mating dance done in the wild.
On Saturday and Sunday, the 27th annual Boomin’ and Bloomin’ festival took place from 7 a.m. to 2 p.m., featuring a wide variety of activities and events.
From 7 a.m. to 9 a.m., festival attendees were able to take a ride out to where the prairie chickens are predominately located to view them in their natural surroundings.
Festival attendees traveled far and wide from all across the country to celebrate the 27th edition of the festival. Amongst the visitors were Robin Prante, Teddy Prante and Mich Prante, who drove out from Houston, to attend the event after finding out about it on social media. Robin says the family are nature lovers and spend a lot of their time outdoors and despite being new to “birding” (birdwatching), they enjoy being outside and couldn’t pass up attending the event.
“We’re not full-fledged birders but we love going out in nature, that’s where we spend most of our time,” said Robin. “We’ve been to state parks and wildlife refuges in Houston and couldn’t pass up coming here after hearing about the event.”
In addition to the chicken viewing, there were additional Native American dance performances, refuge tours, a native plants walk, a guided bird walk, auto and walking tours, kids’ activities, planting activities, live animal displays and food.
The refuge is open to the public 8 a.m. to 3:30 p.m., Wednesday through Friday.
Festival attendees were driven to a designated watching area to get a glimpse of the prairie chicken in its natural habitat. Citizen | Abenezer Yonas
